Drilled

Latest Episodes:

How Big Oil is Using COVID-19 to Push Plastic Apr 16, 2020

Show notes

A new report from the Center for International Environmental Law examines how oil, gas, and petrochemical companies are leveraging the COVID-19 pandemic to push policy and increase profits. Carroll Muffet walks us through key points of the report, including how the industries are using the pandemic to boost single-use plastics.
Read Pandemic Crisis, Systemic Decline: Why Exploiting the COVID-19 Crisis Will Not Save the Oil, Gas, and Plastics Industries.

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Held Hostage by Fracking: Colorado Seniors Shelter In Place Apr 15, 2020

Show notes

As shelter-in-place orders went into effect, residents of Broomfield, Colorado faced exposure to flowback-driven air pollution thanks to their proximity to oil and gas operations. When the city issued an emergency decree to local operations to cease fracking flowback during the pandemic, Extraction Oil filed for a restraining order to block the city's decree. It's the first test of Colorado's 2019 law prioritizing public health and safety over oil and gas production, which allows local governments to set stringent safeguards.
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Climate-COVID-19 policy tracker

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New Research Shows Fossil Fuels Are Not As Essential As The Industry Would Like You to Believe Apr 07, 2020

Show notes

Fossil fuel use has certainly grown GDP, but it has had no effect on life expectancy. In other words, the industry's "benefit" has acrrued to relatively few humans.
Dr. Julia Steinberger, professor of social ecology and ecological economics at the University of Leeds, has published research debunking classic fossil fuel narratives around the industry's importance to society and human wellbeing. Read her study, "Your Money or Your Life?" Environmental Research Letters, here.
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Texas Shale Refineries Release "Unimaginable" Amounts of Methane Emissions Apr 03, 2020

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Field investigator Sharon Wilson has spotted a troubling increase in methane emissions from refineries in the Permian Basin, in Texas. Things went from bad to worse in January 2020, and really blew up in early March ... almost as though they knew regulators wouldn't be watching.

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Why ExxonMobil and Chevron Oppose a Shale Gas Bailout Apr 01, 2020

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The American Petroleum Institute, ExxonMobil and Chevron have been amongst the biggest opponents to bailouts for shale gas companies as part of the coronavirus relief package. DeSmog's Justin Mikulka explains why.

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How Big Oil Exploited the COVID-19 Pandemic Mar 28, 2020

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The oil and gas industry was headed for financial collapse long before COVID-19, but now the Trump administration wants to use the pandemic to put it on life support. Meanwhile, the American Petroleum Institute is using the pandemic to get the industry's deregulation wishlist.

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From Hot Take: Seeing Climate Through Coronavirus Glasses with David Wallace-Wells Mar 25, 2020

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Hot Take hosts Mary Annaise Heglar and Amy Westervelt talk to David Wallace-Wells, author of The Uninhabitable Earth and deputy editor of New York magazine, about the intersection of climate change and the coronavirus pandemic.
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Tackling Disinformation: Jay Rosen & Nicholas Johnson on the Media’s Role Feb 29, 2020

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What can be done about Big Oil disinformation now? New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen and former FCC commissioner Nicholas Johnson join us to talk about everything from the Fairness Doctrine to cable access to today's "post-fact" world, and where we can really go from here. Special thanks to Mary Catherine O'Connor for additional reporting.

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Meet the Harrisons: Architects of Greenwashing and Environmental PR Feb 28, 2020

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E. Bruce and Patricia Harrison launched the E. Bruce Harrison Company in 1973, working for a mix of chemical companies, oil and gas companies, and tobacco companies. E. Bruce is considered the father of environmental public relations—or by his critics, "the godfather of greenwashing."

The Harrisons ran multiple cross-industry coalitions and front groups, aimed primarily at stopping regulation on everything from smoking to carbon emissions. Today, Ms. Harrison is the president and CEO of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a position she's held since 2005.

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The Tobacco-Oil-Plastic Triangle Feb 27, 2020

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John Hill, founder of Hill & Knowlton, was an Ivy Lee devotee who worked for Standard Oil in the 1930s, strategized against labor movements and the New Deal, and wound up representing the American Petroleum Institute and the Tobacco Industry Research Committee—a fake research group formed by the CEOs of all the major tobacco companies in the 1950s—at the very same time. His manipulation skills were so good they even fooled the legendary Edward R. Murrow.

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